This application relates generally to non-volatile semiconductor memories and more specifically to ferroelectric memories.
Many types of semiconductor memories are known and extensively used in computerized systems. One type of memory, the non-volatile memory, fills a special role. Non-volatile memories retain information even if power to the system is lost.
Recently, ferroelectric material has been used to form non-volatile memories. Such memories are formed using thin film processing techniques to make arrays of capacitors with ferroelectric dielectrics. For example, the paper "Preparation of Pb(Zr,Ti)O.sub.3 Thin Films by Sol Gel Processing", published in the Journal of Applied Physics, Volume 64(5), September 1988, describes the formation of a ferroelectric film denoted PZT. In the memory, the capacitors are connected to a grid of row and column control lines with one capacitor connected between each unique pair of a row and a column line. Each capacitor is one cell of the memory and stores one bit of information. This arrangement of cells forms what is commonly called a "cross-point array".
To store a bit of information in a cell, its corresponding row and column control lines are connected to a voltage source. The voltage polarizes the ferroelectric in the capacitor. A positive polarization represents a logic one. A negative polarization represents a logic zero.
To determine what is stored in a cell, a two-step destructive read operation is employed. In the first step, the contents of the cell are sensed. In the sense step, the cell is polarized positively and the displacement current flow into the cell is measured. If no displacement current flow is detected, the cell was previously positively polarized. Thus, no measured displacement current flow implies the cell stored a logic one. Conversely, if displacement current flow is detected, it is known the cell previously stored a logic zero.
After the sense step, the cell will always contain a logic one. If the cell previously stored a logic zero, a second step is required to restore this value. The value is restored by performing a write operation to write a logic zero in the cell.
The destructive readout crosspoint array suffers from several significant shortcomings. The first is called the "half select phenomenon". When a voltage is applied to the array to access one cell in the array, up to one half of that voltage may be dropped across other cells in the array. When a voltage is applied across a row line and a column line to access a cell, only one cell directly connects those two lines. However, there are other paths, called "parasitic paths", through the array which connect those particular row and column lines. These other paths contain more than one cell, which implies that less voltage is dropped across each cell in the parasitic paths. However, in some instances, the voltage across cells in the parasitic paths could be large enough to disturb the operation of those cells.
Heretofore, the half select phenomenon has been avoided by CMOS transistors used to isolate the ferroelectric capacitor in each cell. This approach suffers from two drawbacks. First, CMOS transistors are ill suited for carrying the relatively large amounts of currents needed to charge up the ferroelectric capacitor. The CMOS transistors must be made very large to carry the required current. However, dense memories are often desired and large transistors do not allow dense memories. Also, large CMOS transistors are likely to latch up. If large transistors are not used, the memory will operate slowly. Second, isolation transistors require separate control lines. These lines also take up a lot of space and are not compatible with dense memories.
A second shortcoming of destructive read out ferroelectric memories is that there is a period of time when information is not really in non-volatile memory. In particular, during a read operation, between the sense cycle and restore cycle, the information is not stored in the ferroelectric capacitor. If power to the circuit were lost at that instant, the information would be lost.
A third significant shortcoming of the destructive readout is called "fatigue". Applying a large voltage to the ferroelectric material stresses the material. Over time, the stressed material is less effective at storing charge. The voltage applied to the ferroelectric capacitor stresses the material. After numerous read or write operations, the cell becomes stressed and its performance as a memory becomes degraded. With destructive readout, the ferroelectric capacitor is stressed during writing as well as during the sense portion of the read and the restore portion of the read.